


Angel Baby

by AngelGal



Series: Shepard Gang [1]
Category: That was Then This is Now - S. E. Hinton, The Outsiders (TV 1990), The Outsiders - S. E. Hinton
Genre: Alcohol Abuse, Angela Shepard centric, Angst, Birthday, Comfort, Domestic Violence, Drug Abuse, Physical Abuse, Protective Older Brothers, Short Stories, Verbal Abuse, shepard gang, teen drinking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-09
Updated: 2020-05-09
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:20:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24097966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AngelGal/pseuds/AngelGal
Summary: Her bottom lip wobbled.It was just how it was and it was about time Angela stopped trying to hope for things to be different and grow up- she wasn’t no kid any longer.Ie a collection of stories about the Shepard sister and everyone around her.
Relationships: Angela Shepard & Tim Shepard, Bryon Douglas/Angela Shepard
Series: Shepard Gang [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1738663
Comments: 4
Kudos: 12





	Angel Baby

**Author's Note:**

> This is shorter and also different from what I usually write but the setting and characteristics of Angela remind me so much of myself and family members and I really want to give her a voice. Hope you guys like it!

Angela sat in her muddy and torn dress. It had been new- or at least new to her. Tim had known this day was coming and had come home one morning as she had one foot out the door, shoving a crinkly bag with some kind of yellow frog logo on the face of it, and then disappearing into one of the bedrooms. 

She had taken a minute to peel through the endless coverings of recycled tissue paper and almost gotten the tar beaten out of her for screaming, Tim walking back out without a shirt and a mean mug on his face. 

What she had pulled out was a knee-length bouffant-style black dress with small blue flowers painted onto the first layer of fabric. Around the chest and peeking under the skirt were cinched and then poofy electric blue tulle. It was perfect. 

Tim tried to hide it when he saw how happy Angela was but he couldn’t hold back from smirking if only slightly. She pumped up, clutching the dress to her chest and bouncing up and down, making her school bag on her shoulder bounce as she jumped to Tim to give him a quick kiss on the cheek and squeeze around his middle.

“Hey, careful now fluffy duck, yer gon’ rough up the damn thing,” Tim scolded but hugged her back, reaching to smooth out her long wild hair. She had looked up, resting her chin on his chest and smiling wide so that even her two jagged canine teeth were poking out- something she always tried to hide. 

Seeing her so happy made Tim’s chest feel tight in a good kind of way; the used dress more than worth conning- with the help of a certain sticky-fingered greaser from the Curtis gang, of course. 

It was her thirteenth birthday that weekend and she had been invited to go hang out with a mix of some middle class and hood friends. But it was a dressier kind of mixer and she had tried to get their mom to help her get something nice but she had been too tired and bitter to give her a second out of the day unless it was to yell about how lazy or loose she was. 

Besides her mom, their dad was in the pin for at least the next eight months so she couldn’t ask him. If anything, he’s always pressing her and her sibling for money on his books for cigarettes- as if his lungs needed tar to live. 

She walked with Curly and all his rowdy and hungover friends to school that morning smiling instead of the usual yelling and mean-hearted jokes directed to the boys around her. She was too busy, her head dancing with excitement as she imagined the night she would have in that dress. 

Tim sat next to her, pretending not to notice the mascara running down her face or the dirt under her nails- or even the smell of liquor coming from her… everything. Lighting a cigarette, the flame brightened their cold features in the dark blue of the night. 

The thing about the Shepard siblings is that being cold and dark was their thing in a way- their skin was dark, their hair was dark, their smirks and glares and silver tongues anything but light-hearted or shinny. There were no happy days or rose-colored feelings- not even for the baby girl of the family. It was just how it was and it was about time Angela stopped trying to hope for things to be different and grow up- she wasn’t no kid any longer. 

She looked at her older brother, wishing he’d say something instead of just sitting there as if she was the odd thing out in his nightly front porch smoke. That was sort of when she noticed how busted his knuckles and cheek were and how messy his own clothes looked. 

It clicked what had most likely gone down when she had stormed out to run off her anger, having just gotten back but too drained to go inside. 

“Where pa at? The house sound’ too quiet…” She said quietly, her voice defensive but tired. Picking the dirt from under her nails, she tried pretending like Tim’s answer didn’t mean anything more than trash to her- but she had to admit it was a lie.

Tim didn’t talk at first, tagging a few more slow drags before even glancing in her direction. “Pro’lly out somewhere tryin’ to land right back into the place he just got released from.” He sounded bitter, they all were, but not surprised. They had all practically bawled laughing when they heard he was released on good behavior the day before her birthday party was supposed to happen. 

The first day he was out no one knew where he was or who had picked him up when he got released- but it didn’t take long for him to make himself known, stumbling in drunk while Curly was about to drop her off while she finished getting ready. 

Everything was downhill from there, everyone was hoping they could get him to pass out on the couch or something before Angela would have to deal with it but he had pushed through the sea of boys probably to go find their mother who has currently wasting away at a night shift. 

Their father was just as big as Tim but skinner and misshaped from a combination of drugs, alcohol, and age. Still, though, it had scared her slightly when he came barreling into her room the boys and their friends on his tail. He was mostly mumbling and yelling gibberish, spitting as he got close to her face, making her push away from him. 

He had called her a whore and whatever else he could think of, pulling at her dress and grabbing her a little too tight. That was enough for Tim to rip him out of the room and take him to the backyard to deal with. Angela and Curly were out the door and almost made it to the wired car when Mr. Shepherd came through the side yard, yelling at her and trying to get her to look at him. Curly was even starting to feel bad, getting in between the two of them but regretting it when their father packed a hard punch to his already crooked nose, promptly fixing it. 

He had grabbed Angela then and backhanded her to the ground. Since he was drunk he was a little bit sloppier than usual and Angela was about to get a few good hits in before one good slap got her feeling too dizzy to care. The ground was wet and muddy and cold and she wanted it to swallow her up. 

Once the weight of her dad was lifted off of her she got up and ran. She felt like she was seeing without actually seeing, breathing but holding her breath, crying but feeling nothing at all. This was what it was like before he went to prison and she’s guessing this is what it was going to be like now that he’s out. 

At one point she had found herself at the sports field the hood boys used to play whatever game of ball they wanted to and saw some people she kind of recognized from school and parties. 

She even remembers fighting some random girl at one point after hanging with them for a while for getting too comfortable with her boyfriend and one of her middle-class friends finding her and getting mad that she couldn’t manage to show up to her own party until she noticed her current physical state. 

After drinking her weight in booze and getting the number of some concerned boy named Bryon, She made the trudge back home knowing it would be worse for her if one of the boys found her and had to make the awkward drive home. 

Tim had wanted to do many things. Run after her, beat the life out of their piece of shit father, kill him even, but it wouldn’t change anything. He still beat the shit out of his and made sure he knew that if he ever came back and showed his face to her again he would take his ass to hell. 

“How’s yer mug, lookin’, baby?” he asked, bringing up a hand to lightly hold her chin and move her face here and there. She pushed his hand away dismissively, bringing her feet up a step so that her knees were to her small chest stuffed with tulle and tissue paper.

Her lip wobbled, maybe because of the old nickname Tim hadn’t used in years or the fact that she never made it to her party, but she couldn’t help it. 

He pulled her into his side, hugging her close and protectively squeezing her boney shoulder as she cried. He kept on smoking, sitting there long enough to even light up a second one as Angela cried it all out. Their mom had even gotten home by the time she was whipping her eyes and unclasping the buckle around her ankle from her party shoes to start getting ready for bed. 

Mrs. Shepherd had put the puzzle pieces together and sighed, helping Angela up and taking her into her nicer bathroom connected to the mother’s master bedroom. She had helped clean her up, helping her bathe and washing her back, taking her into the bedroom to borrow a soft nightgown and brushing out her silky hair. Angela teared up a couple more times, closing her eyes and breathing heavily as she tried to think of other things. 

Her mother didn’t say anything comforting, instead, saying small unnecessary comments here and there, but she let her sleep in her bed with her and that was more than enough for Angela. If anything, this was probably the nicest their mom was ever going to be in a very long time.

This is what it was like to be a Shepherd girl, she figured, slowly falling into sleep and preparing for what it was going to be like from here on out as an official teenager.

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know what you think and also if you have a prompt idea for this! Thank you for reading!


End file.
